If you take the time to consider just how many digital systems your business relies on to stay operational, chances are it's a very long listBut as critical as those systems may be, ensuring they’re protected from outside threats is equally important.
Security audits help you build a secure framework for your systems while providing you with the due diligence necessary to harden all your supporting business infrastructure elements.
However, with modern-day security becoming more complex and digital threats becoming even more frequent and dangerous, relying on updated auditing tactics is critical. This is where the inclusion of penetration testing into your auditing processes can be invaluable.
Understanding the Importance of Business Security Audits
Business security audits are formal processes used to evaluate the effectiveness of security policies, organizational processes, and the various technical safeguards organizations have in place. These checks cover areas such as hardware updates, software configurations, network security, and the level of security awareness employees have.
The Importance of Data Security and Compliance
A critical element of regular security auditing is to help organizations maintain various data security and compliance standards. Not only is this important for meeting certain industry requirements, but it’s also critical when maintaining trust and credibility in the eyes of customers.
Security audits provide a structured format for reviewing any applicable laws or regulations required by businesses and identifying any potential areas where they’re not in compliance. By following a systematic process for reviewing underlying infrastructure, data encryption protocols, and disaster recovery initiatives, businesses can take a much more proactive stance in strengthening their data security.
Navigating AI Compliance
With more businesses becoming reliant on AI technology to help automate their processes, there are considerations that need to be made when it comes to certain AI compliance standards.
Because of the significant volumes of data that most AI tools access, making sure you’re taking the proper precautions when protecting your customers’ privacy is critical. Security audits designed to evaluate AI systems and their data handling practices are becoming crucial.
Security audits can help verify whether or not AI tools meet all the requirements of industry regulations like GDPR or CCPA, while also helping to identify potential vulnerabilities that need to be addressed.
What is Penetration Testing?
Penetration testing, also known as “pen testing,” involves hiring outside security teams to launch simulated attacks against your business in an effort to discover hidden vulnerabilities in connected networks and systems.
The core objective of pen testers is to identify vulnerabilities that aren’t always easy to find, while providing businesses with clear instructions on how to avoid allowing these vulnerabilities to become exploited.
Penetration tests usually happen in multiple structured phases, including planning, reconnaissance, network scanning, simulating attacks, and generating a thorough analysis of their findings.
The Synergy Between Security Audits and Penetration Testing
While security auditing and penetration testing may seem like two separate approaches to evaluating your security readiness, they can actually be used to complement each other.
Security audits are a good solution when you want to get a broad overview of the overall integrity of your systems while also making sure you have the right policies or processes in place. Penetration testing, on the other hand, is focused more on narrowing down your focus to identify much more specific issues that need to be addressed.
How Penetration Testing Can Help Uncover New Vulnerabilities
Unlike traditional security audits, which are considered a more passive approach to cybersecurity, penetration testing actively stress-tests your systems while looking for weaknesses. Instead of just checking boxes against certain industry benchmarks, penetration testing simulates real attack methods by ethical hackers trained to exploit systems the same way cybercriminals do.
These more invasive forms of testing help to uncover potential threats that not all formal audits may catch. For example, penetration testing often involves using multiple attack scenarios at once while combining various methods to breach security defenses. Many times, it’s not one main issue that leads to a successful data breach, but several more minor system flaws that can be chained together.
Different Types of Penetration Testing
Because of the dynamic nature of modern-day cybersecurity, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all strategy to penetration testing. Most penetration testing services use a variety of different approaches when evaluating different businesses. Some of the most common strategies they use include:
- Black Box Testing - Black box testing involves ethical hacking teams attempting to breach company defenses without having any prior knowledge of the organization’s structure or unlying infrastructure. This is typically done to stress test the outer security perimeter to gain initial network access.
- White Box Testing - White box gives testing teams advanced knowledge of their target environment before they begin their simulated attacks. The information they have could include network maps, “stolen” user credentials, or various configuration files that can help them to develop more sophisticated attack methods.
- Gray Box Testing - Gray box testing is often used to simulate an attack that could originate from inside the organization. In these situations, attackers have a significant amount of information and varying levels of access on their target systems, allowing them to move quickly across networks.
Integrating Penetration Testing into Your Security Strategy
While penetration testing isn’t something you need to plan every month, it is something that should be considered a regular part of your security auditing process. Conducting regular penetration tests helps the business discover new vulnerabilities close to when they emerge, allowing businesses to fill essential security gaps.
During this process, clear communication with your internal teams is essential. This is especially important when making sure internal security teams and penetration testers are working closely together to both identify and mitigate new risks.
Ultimately, finding vulnerabilities is only the first step. The real payoff from penetration testing comes from using the results to actively address weaknesses and create a stronger overall security posture.
Make Penetration Testing an Important Part of Your Security Planning
As your business scales, it’s essential to make regular security auditing and penetration testing a critical part of your growth strategy. Doing this will help you to develop a comprehensive security strategy that keeps your business compliant with industry standards and more resilient against modern security threats.
